A NOVEL PUNISHMENT
A voice, that of Menud, came mockingly from above! As the roar of
falling rocks lessened, the words became audible:
“Oho, Garram the independent, Garram the skilled hunter, now is your
end! If you move or try even to rise high enough to put an arrow to
bow, a rock will split you, or pulp you as a lizard’s egg is smashed
when a house falls. Can you hear me, or are you too frightened to find
speech?”
Garram chanced a swift glance over the top of his cover, but had barely
time to duck back again, to dodge a swiftly sliding rock. It would have
sliced off the top of his head as if it had been an egg.
Then the voice began again. “While my friends keep you penned with
sliding rocks, while you tremble with fear, I will work round to this
spur which looks into your little home from the side. Then I will fill
you with arrows as one fills a target! Is not the plan good?”
Garram trembled, but with powerless rage, not fear. Above and to
the side boulders started to slide and bang their way in increasing
numbers, making it impossible for him to get out. Below him there was
nothing but an almost straight drop into the steep valley. The little
cleft in the hillside, rather like an eye socket, had him penned in.
Only by bending down almost double did the brow of the socket save him
from hurtling rocks, and even so his back was bleeding from splinters
of the granite.
There was a sound as of the snapping of fingers and the first arrow
struck the rock by the crouching boy. Even as it struck, Garram noticed
a possible means of escape. Risky to the limit of risk, but better than
certain death by poisoned arrows. It was a slight flaw in the rock-face
below him, just enough to allow finger and toe to wedge themselves in
and give him a chance to reach the bottom.
Then, with almost a groan, he abandoned the one way back to life. In
his peril he had forgotten Ibrahim, lying there, unable to move. If the
Fulani got into the hands of Menud, he would probably pray for death
long before death took him!
More arrows struck, shivering on the face of the rock. Then Garram
sprang suddenly to full height, one hand pulling at the end of an arrow
which stuck out of his side, the other vainly scrabbling at the rock.
With a scream he fell, wriggled and twisted till one arm lay over the
edge of the ledge and the body seemed ready to plunge down. A kick and
a twist seemed almost to push it off, then another brought it back
again, the hand still desperately grasping the protruding arrow shaft;
then, with a final squirm, it lay still.
[Illustration]
No more arrows fell, and presently the hail of rocks stopped roaring
down the face of the cliff. Menud sprang forth into the open and
clambered down the ledge. For a moment he stood, eyes fixed on the
motionless body. Picking up a small stone, he threw it with all his
force. It struck the twisted shape with a thud, but the body did not
twitch.
“Good, so the rat is at last dead!” he cried, and signing to his
followers to approach, the overgrown loutish leader let himself down
over the socket of the ledge, cautiously moving forward. Digging
the motionless figure in the ribs with his toe, hand on knife as a
precaution, he then bent down to examine more closely the staring open
eyes of the flung-back head.
Then of a sudden he felt a hand at his throat, and a poisoned arrow
head was within an inch of his eye. Menud flung up his arms in an
instinctive movement to release the hand at his neck, then froze at
the menace that faced him. A quiet voice remarked, “Not so hurriedly,
Menud! You should have waited longer, perhaps another forty years, to
have found me dead.” And Garram, with one hand disarming him, threw
knife and weapons clattering over the edge, keeping Menud’s bow only
long enough to cut loose the bowstring. And all the while the stump of
poisoned arrow was within an inch of his enemy’s eye.
“And now you can order back your pack of imitation murderers while I
make _my_ arrangements!”
Menud shivered. Terrible death was his alternative. With teeth and one
hand Garram tied the arms of his enemy behind him, the dread arrow
holding him in agonized fear. As they emerged from the shelter of the
ledge into the view of Menud’s followers, the latter looked for an
order from their leader. Then, realizing that something was amiss, they
charged down the slippery face of the rock only to pull up with a moan
of horror as they realized their position.
Garram beckoned them to approach, and the party moved toward Ibrahim.
The grotesque angles of his twisted legs made the poor Fulani look
very terrible, but Garram had had the usual experiences with hunting
accidents, his own and others’, and knew that this was not serious.
“A litter of boughs, and if it is not brought immediately you die!”
Menud’s followers did not need the confirmation of the order from
their leader, but scattered quickly; and before Garram had made
a preliminary examination of Ibrahim’s injuries, they were back,
breathless and scratched and still trimming the boughs with their
knives as they ran.
The youths had obeyed Menud’s orders, since he had made himself by
sheer physical strength their leader, but his intolerable conceit and
folly made him no popular figure. As much out of friendship to Garram
as to save Menud, they now set about making what preparations they
could for the wounded Captain of the Guard, resetting the legs with
splints and a skilful padding of leaves tight bound with bowstrings.
Then an awful thought struck Garram. Where was Kon? None knew. Since
the first fall of rock no one had seen him. He would not have run away,
so the hideous truth became clear. A rock must have swept him over the
precipice! Dragging the terrified Menud, Garram sought along the brink,
calling as he went. But there was no answer.
The bulging face of the rock prevented the boy’s seeing into the valley
beneath, but there was no sign of the dog clinging to any of the sparse
tufts of bush and grass which clung here and there to crevices. And
there would have been no way of getting him up or down the almost sheer
face, even if he had thus been saved by a miracle.
Garram’s grip on Menud’s throat tightened till he whined for mercy.
Gone was the almost mocking manner with which the young hunter had
faced his own and Ibrahim’s predicament.
“One dog of mine you caused to die. If Kon too is dead--no, you
will not die--only your eyes--and nose--and ears will be taken from
you--with a clean knife, so that you will live many years to remember!”
One party moved off, carrying Ibrahim slowly and carefully on the
improvised litter, a man on each side fanning the still unconscious
patient with boughs to keep off the plague of flies. Garram and Menud
and a search party sought a way down to the valley where Kon must lie.
Twice, with difficulty, they were forced to retrace their steps,
faced with the sheer drop in front of them. Then, as they tried again,
Garram’s face settled into grim and yet grimmer lines, a cold nose was
thrust into his hand from behind.
It was the dog, who had found another way up. Kon, gashed by the
treetops into which he must have fallen, feet almost raw from his
scrabbling efforts to save himself as he slipped down and down the
precipice, but thrilled at his adventure and grinning his happiness at
being back again.
The gentle hands of the young hunter searched anxiously for broken
bones or other hidden harm. But none could be found, and it was a
relieved and almost joyous party that hurried to overtake Ibrahim.
All through that day and the next day they traveled almost without halt
or food, Kon seemingly recovered after a bath in the stream at the foot
of the hill. At noon the next day the surprising procession passed
through the gates and into the city of Yelwa, leaving Ibrahim in the
care of his relatives.
The next evening the Captain of the Guard had recovered sufficiently
to be carried on a door to see a sight which Garram said might
amuse him. Garram had hired a dye pit for the day. The dye pit is a
cylinder-shaped hole in the ground, lined with native cement. Into this
hole clothes to be dyed are put to soak in a noxious smelling mixture
of rotting indigo.
Round the mouth of this particular dye pit Kon was circling, barking
with glee at something within. Ibrahim, on being carried to the brink,
raised himself slightly to see what was going on, then lay back, the
better to give vent to the laughter which was choking him. For in the
pit, unarmed and unbound, stood Menud, gradually absorbing a richer and
ever more lasting stain of indigo.
When he would have raised himself at one side of the pit, Kon circled
after him and met the upturned face and gripping fingers with pawings
and playful snaps of the powerful jaws, which caused Menud to drop
back each time with a juicy plop into the rich mixture below. This had
been going on all day, and with Kon on duty to see that the sentence
was carried out, continued till nightfall, much to the amusement of the
whole market, who came to jeer and to point.
After a day’s soaking in the warm mush and a night’s drying to make the
dye more lasting, Menud was judged fit to proceed. The next day he, a
villain of the deepest dye, and his followers left the city for the
Hills again, Menud vowing vengeance as he went.
A PIGLET ACTS FOR GARRAM
[Illustration]